


Servant and Served

by wanderingaesthetic



Category: Jupiter Ascending (2015)
Genre: F/M, M/M, Multi, Suicide Attempt, discussion of suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-02
Updated: 2015-06-02
Packaged: 2018-04-02 13:05:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4061095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wanderingaesthetic/pseuds/wanderingaesthetic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The dance of Entitled and Splice. Titus promised Famulus an eternity once, and she was going to take it from him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Servant and Served

A primary of a powerful house does not do his own shopping, even when shopping for something so personal as his next lover. So when Ataro Demen was looking for a first rate genomgineered human, it was a tall, pale woman that looked like she might have a bit of rabbit in her that walked into the showroom of Amphora Genotech.

Famulus watched the woman through one eye, posing in careful laziness in a sculpture of false tree roots. A dozen of her fellow splices made similar poses in the little created forest, or danced to unheard music, or twined in each other’s arms, whatever they had been told would make them most appealing.

The Amphora nursery was Famulus’ playground and school. It was all that she knew, but like the students of any other school, she itched to leave and see the galaxy beyond, even if it meant never looking back. Famulus didn’t know who the rabbit-lady worked for, but Famulus was for sale, and she wanted to be bought.

The rabbit lady walked among the splices, pausing occasionally to ask questions or feel a bit of skin or hair or fur.

She eventually came near Famulus and took her chin in one long, white hand. Famulus leaned into the rough grasp as if it were a caress, and stared up at her red eyes.

“What is your name?”

“Famulus,” she said, hooding her eyes and letting a soft smile touch her lips, keeping up her show of lazy seduction while her heart hammered in her chest.

“How old are you?”

“Seventeen,” she said, and made a careless little shrug. She didn’t know how old she was in fact, but this was what she was taught to say.

“Would you like to serve House Demen?”

Famulus brought a coy smile to her lips again. “Would House Demen like to serve me?”

The woman’s eyes scraped over her lips, her breasts, her left hand on one cocked hip, all the way to her bare feet.

“Yes, I think he will like you.”

**

“These are the centerpieces of my collection,” Titus said as he led her into the central room.

“This one,” Titus said with a grand sweep of his hand. “Is Nytersinae, Sargorn goddess of war. This,” he continued, gesturing toward the figure of reclining young man. “Is a sculpture of Didier du Vega, said to be the best physical specimen of a human being alive until he died in a skimmer accident on Tantalus 9. He actually sat for this likeness. You know, he only modeled for one other and I’ll confess it is the superior.”

Famulus followed him, gazing at the statuary and saying nothing. Titus met her eyes every now and again, gauging her reaction to one piece or another.

“I like to consider myself a connoisseur of all beautiful things, but one goes quite mad trying to collect everything. So I’ve confined myself to sculpture. A painting or a photograph can be appreciated from a mere remote image, but sculpture must be walked around, seen from different angles, touched if possible.”

He reached for Nysterinae’s kneecap as he spoke, “That’s the chiefest advantage in owning the piece yourself. Museums tend to get upset if you go around fondling the marbles.”

“What about this one?” Famulus asked. Most of the statues were human or humanoid in shape, but this one was abstract, a silvery column that sparkled with grains of some mineral and a clear material shaped like drops of water.

“Ah yes,” Titus said fondly. “That is the last piece created by Viregian. Legend has it he went for a swim, and as he was paddling around he became captivated with the railing on the stairs leading into his pool. Being an artist, he decided to recreate the exact way the sunlight hit the condensation, but writ large. He toiled over it for nearly a decade, but upon finishing the piece he fell into a depression. You see, he believed the artifice came nowhere near matching the real thing. As he saw it, that made his life as an artist worthless, and he committed suicide.”

“That’s insane,” said Famulus.

“Is it?”

**

Cybele was the rabbit-lady’s name. She gave Famulus little time for goodbyes, and brought her aboard a small but well-appointed vessel with only one other crew member, an android called Shift.

With Famulus’ deed now in Cybele’s hands, Famulus dropped her knowing and sexy act and felt free to gape at the sights of Georjes City. She had lived here all her life, but had seen little of it. Only when she was sick and taken to a physician had she ever left the nursery.

She saw only a flash of it: the needletip point of a skyscraper three-hundred stories tall, a public sculpture of spiraling wings. Then clouds, sky, blackness.

**

“Now, this is the _real_ reason I brought you here,” Titus said, pausing before a set of double doors. “I thought you might enjoy this, seeing how you liked that little trinket.”

 _That little trinket_ was a tear-drop shaped diamond an inch in diameter that now hung on a chain between Famulus’ breasts. It was one of several gifts that Titus had given her before formally purchasing her. All were small in size, to be kept hidden from Ataro, but none were small in cost or significance.  Famulus was a slave and couldn’t technically own anything, not a diamond necklace or the clothes on her back. If Ataro had found it and found out who it came from, he would have been within his rights to take it for himself and kill her. Titus had merely smiled and put a finger to his lips. _I know exactly what I’m doing, but can you really resist me?_ His eyes said. _Can you really say no to something so grand?_

Titus threw the double doors wide. Famulus gasped.

“My brother, for all his harsh austerity, has rather a weakness for shiny things,” Titus said by way of explanation.

The room was the size and shape of a long banquet hall, but with a series of terraced platforms rising up from the center. Each level held rows of chests and displays of chains and jewels, medallions, bracelets, armlets and full sets of glistening ornamental armor tailored for a tall, lithe figure. It wasn’t quite a museum and it wasn’t quite a pirate’s hoard, Famulus thought as she followed Titus inside. Every piece was placed with feigned carelessness--exactly where the light would hit it best. There were too many treasures too close together, as if to make the beholder wonder, not at the artistry of each individual piece, but at the sheer mass and expense of so many beautifully cut jewels and metals. The low lighting shifted almost imperceptibly, making every piece glimmer.

“See anything you’d like to try on?” Titus asked.

“Won’t Lord Balem mind?” Famulus asked, twisting around to find Titus, who was lifting a delicate silver circlet.

“I’m family,” Titus said with a twisted smile. “He has no choice but to begrudge me my whims. Here, this belonged to my mother, I think it may suit you.”

A corner of Famulus’ mouth upturned in amused doubt. “I don’t think it will fit over my horns,” she said wryly.

“I suppose not,” Titus said with a pout. “But there are plenty of other things to gild you with. Here,” he said, sliding a ring on her middle finger. He wrapped the chain that was attached to it around her wrist. On her other wrist he slid a thick cuff encrusted in tiny opals.

Titus stepped back to examine his handwork.

“I think, in order to get the entire effect, I should like to see that diamond I gave you,” Titus said.

Famulus paused. Of course, she could just pull the jewel from beneath her blouse, but that wasn’t what Titus wanted. She locked eyes with him as she unbuttoned it and shrugged it off.

“Yes,” Titus hissed as he considered her. “But I don’t think it’s quite… enough.”

Famulus sat primly on the lowest terrace and waited as Titus flitted around like some bizarre honeybee that landed on only the shiniest of flowers. He looped several long, gold chains around her neck. Intricate rings and cuffs decked her ears. He bent to place chains around her ankles and rings on her toes. He needed her to take off her skirt, of course, to drape a net of very tiny diamonds and emeralds around her waist. At last he crowned her with an ornate headdress of what looked something like enamel peacock feathers.

Such attentions to her body ended as they were wont to, and Titus had her bent over a chest of platinum medallions when Balem came crashing into his treasury.

Famulus froze, but Titus didn’t stop fucking her. In fact, she had a terrible suspicion that when Titus shuddered with orgasm he was looking right at Balem.

Balem, for his part, took in a long, quivering breath and stared up at a corner of the ceiling. Titus pulled out of her quite calmly, but Famulus was still frozen, not knowing what move to make. Titus wasn’t giving her any cues.

Balem paid no attention to Famulus at all, but pinned Titus with a look of utmost loathing.

“ _You_ ,” Balem said slowly, in a voice between a whisper and a growl. “You have defiled my possessions.”

Famulus fumbled to begin taking off the massive amounts of jewelry that were weighing her down, but froze again as Balem became unhinged.

“ _NO! Take them!”_ He screamed. _“Leave and take them with you! Get them out of my sight!_ ”

Balem took in several shuddering breaths, not looking at either of them, and turned to go, sweeping his long sleeves around him.

“Well,” Titus said, wrapping his robes around himself with a self-satisfied smirk. “I think that went as well as could be expected.”

**

Ataro Demen’s alcazar was called Molidae, a planet that was mostly water, a fitting throne for the house with the largest share of the water trade. His primary residence was an island near the equator, a maze of fountains and tropical gardens with a mansion in the center that looked as if were carved from polished jade. He was indisposed when Cybele and Famulus arrived, so Famulus was allowed to wander freely with a communication device in the form of an earring that would call her back to the residence when required.

She wandered mosaic paths through every shape of palm tree, past birds of paradise and hibiscus flowers bigger than her head in pale green and sapphire blue and purple and black zebra stripes. She had never seen such a variety of life before, and started at every lizard and tiny insect that darted or flew along her path. She finally settled in a cool alcove behind an artificial waterfall and contemplated her fate while she awaited her master’s pleasure.

Eventually, a man approached, skirting the pool that her waterfall spilled into. He was dark-skinned and naked from the waist up save for a necklace of polished stones, and unlike the servants and gardeners Famulus had seen so far on this island, he showed no sign of being a splice. As he joined Famulus behind her waterfall, she understood that he must be Ataro Demen himself.

“You must be Cybele’s present,” he said in a deep, rich voice. He looked her over, giving Famulus a chance to do the same to him. He was muscular and handsome, with high cheekbones, full lips, and eyes subtly emphasized with dark makeup. Unless he was unusually cruel, he would not be a trial to serve sexually. “We must find you something else to wear,” he said. “Or you may do without, if you prefer.”

“No,” she said. “Clothes would be…. Good.”

“What arts have you been trained in, my dear?”

Famulus named the schools of pleasure she had been taught. All in theory and simulation, of course, since performing the act itself before she was sold would be like breaking the seal on a fine bottle of wine.

He seemed satisfied, and left her to her own devices until she was to meet him in his quarters at an appointed time later that evening.

When that time came, he laid her down in slick, green sheets, and massaged her entire body with a fragrant oil that made her skin tingle at every touch. By the time the deed was done, Famulus felt as much served as servant, and slept, spent and grateful, curled against her master’s ribs.

It would not remain so.

**

“He liked to ignore me, and have me beg to be touched until he relented.”

“That seems a fun sort of game,” Titus said.

“Perhaps,” Famulus said slowly. “If I had been willing, and if he had not been drugging me with something that tripled my sex drive.”

Titus hissed through his teeth. “Kelfing’s Ambrosia? I’ve been on that. Why, that must have been _torture._ ”

“I had a bracelet that monitored my vitals, so if I touched myself, he would know. I was punished if I did.”

“Punished how?”

“Made to go naked, usually. He had me walk on all fours for a day, once. Usually I would wind up slaking my lust on one of the other servants. _That_ was allowed. I never understood why.”

“It’s a…” Titus made a vague, wavy hand gesture. “Power thing. And you said Ataro didn’t keep any male servants, so that’s part of it. Some men are weird about that. Still… how would you like playing that game with me?”

“How would you like if I made _you_ beg?”

“Oh, but how long would you be able to resist me?” He knelt beside her and pouted. “Oh, Famulus, fuck me, please!”

She shoved him away. He fell back on the bed, laughing.

“Famulus!” he moaned. “I’m dying and your cunt is the only thing that can save me!”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said, and smacked him with a pillow.

“This does nothing for you?”

“I admit, having your most ancient and entitled ass at my mercy does _something_ for me.”

His eyes darkened and he fell suddenly serious. “Famulus, please, I would sell—no, give away--a hundred worlds for one _moment_ of your favor. Please touch me, Famulus,” he begged in real or exaggerated breathlessness.

She stared for a moment before she buried one hand in his hair and pulled it to expose his neck. Titus squirmed in pleasure. Famulus crawled atop him, and scraped her nails and her teeth over his chest and his neck, biting the flesh near his ear hard enough to bruise.

“I could kill you if I wanted to,” Famulus whispered, her breath tickling his ear and causing him to shiver.

He turned his head to whisper in turn: “I’d let you.”

She buried a hand roughly in his hair again, and crawled to put her knees on either side of his ears. “Let’s put that pretty entitled mouth of yours to good work, first.”

**

Cybele approached her in the library one afternoon to ask Famulus how she was adjusting.

“Honestly, I don’t know,” Famulus said at last, letting the sheave she had been reading fall into her lap.

“Is something troubling you?” the rabbit splice asked.

“It’s just… is this all there is? Coming when I’m called and doing as I’m told?”

“Servitude is what you make of it,” Cybele said cryptically, sitting on an upholstered bench near her.

“It’s just, I always preferred the arts that…” Famulus stopped and blushed.

“I was a pleasure slave myself once, girl. You may speak to me of this freely.”

“I always liked the arts that were about taking control. About making your lover want to _give_ you control. And Ataro… Ataro doesn’t like that. Not at all.”

“You feel you are poorly utilized.”

“Yes?” That wasn’t the sum of it, Famulus thought, but that was a part.

“Make no mistake, Famulus, you were chosen because I thought Ataro would like the look of you. Any skills you have were a secondary consideration.”

Famulus stared at the sheave in her hands.

“But keep in mind, Ataro did not choose you. _I_ chose you. I knew I would have to share my home with you. I chose someone I could respect, and perhaps, befriend.”

“I’m glad you hold me in esteem,” Famulus said after a pause. “But I’m not sure you did me a favor.”

“You say that only because this is the only household you have ever belonged to,” Cybele accused. “You could have far more difficult and more dangerous tasks in much less splendor.”

“I suppose you’re right.”

“If you ever become frustrated,” Cybele said. “Ask yourself: if a man’s cock is between your teeth, who is really in charge?”

**

“Famulus,” Titus purred as she approached him. He was standing on an observation deck in the finest hotel in Orus’ inner ring, and bizarrely for a man of Titus’ station, he was completely alone.

“Famulus,” Titus sang out her name again, swaying as he did so. From where he stood he had a fantastic view of humanity’s home planet as the ring swung around it. Orus’ sun shone on the other side of the planet, leaving this side in constellations of man-made light that shone nearly as bright.

“My Lord Demen sent me to find you,” Famulus said apprehensively. Titus was as drunk as she had ever seen him, and in the time she had traveled with Ataro and Titus, Famulus had seen Titus Abrasax fantastically, exquisitely, _marvelously_ fucked up on almost any substance that would do the job. Yet Titus was as far gone now as she had ever seen him. His delicate skin glistened with sweat. He moved his head from side to side, trying to bring her into focus. _Breathing_ seemed to be requiring him effort. He might be able to make it back to his suite in this state, but he would probably have to crawl.

“Where are your Royal Guard?” Famulus asked.

“Sent them away,” Titus explained simply. “They make an awful lot of noise. CLANK CLANK CLANK CLANK,” he said, mimicking their shuffling walk and fighting to regain what passed for his balance when he stumbled. “And they might feel obligated to step in, if… you know.”

“No, I don’t know.”

“Oh, Famulus,” he said sincerely, and put a hand on each of her shoulders and looked into her eyes with an intensity that might have been uncomfortable if she thought he were able to see straight. His hands were trembling. “I have taken an _awful_ lot of drugs. Calacoa and harmonin and YND and ambrosia, and things I don’t even know the name of, and you know, about a quart of plain old liquor to wash it down with. And I think I might really actually die this time.”

He sat down on the floor. Famulus wasn’t sure whether he did so deliberately or whether his knees had buckled. Either way, he scooted himself toward the edge of the observation deck and dangled his legs over the side. If he fell, he would hit the floor of the hotel lobby thirty stories below, but the drop held no real danger for him. The gravity fields were such that anything or anyone that fell would float down harmlessly, landing lighter than a feather. Still, Titus’ proximity to the ledge made Famulus’ pulse quicken. Titus hugged the post that held up the railing and pressed his face against it.

“All these people…” Titus said, gesturing wearily at the planet before them. “Most of them will die before they’re 200, you know? That’s sad. I don’t think I got the hang of it til 500 at least. How am supposed to kill these people? How am I supposed to kill even the lucky ones? I could do it. Should.”

“I should get you some help…” Famulus said slowly.

“Nooooo,” Titus wailed, tapping his head against the post he was hugging. “Don’t want. Don’t deserve.”

“I should still—“ Famulus said, turning to leave, but Titus grabbed her wrist.

“No, don’t leave me!” he begged. “Don’t leave me.”

“Okay,” Famulus said, against her better judgement, and sat down beside him. “I won’t leave you.”

“Good, good,” he said, dropping his arm. “You’re better than me, Famulus. Kinder. Stronger. Prettier. Balem’s stupid. We Entitled are _ticks._ Do you know of ticks?Big, fat, ugly, bloodsucking bugs. I am a tick the size of this _planet_. And Kalique, _aaaaaggggh,_ Kalique. ‘Just close your eyes, Just close your eyes!’” he said in a high-pitched, mocking voice. “When I close my eyes I see Califex and Doligan and dead eyes and blue dust. But I can’t help it. I can’t help it, I just want to live. Mother, I just want to live.” He was crying now, in huge, racking sobs that Famulus had never seen in an adult.

Famulus didn’t know what to do, so when he leaned into her, she pulled him into her chest, and held him close, and let him babble and cry.

“You’re good, Famulus,” he said when he was finally making sense again. “Very good splice. I’ll make you mine if I live through the night. I’m a man of my word.”

**

Her greatest enemy in Ataro’s alcazar was boredom. She wasn’t Ataro’s only pleasure slave, so she didn’t work every night, or even every week. Her position was more or less that of a beloved pet. She had most of the luxuries Ataro appreciated, beautiful lodging, free roam of a small tropical paradise, access to a vast number of sheaves containing any entertainment or information on any subject she could wish to know about. But she didn’t have anything to _do._ Except swim in Ataro’s ocean. And befriend Ataro’s other servants. And hoard knowledge she would never have any use for from Ataro’s sheaves.

She swam in the sea, as many of Ataro’s subjects did for recreation. One day, she swam out alone and knelt on the sandbar, letting the sun shine on her face and the waves lap over her shoulders. The waves were gentle, as the waves always were in Ataro’s ocean.

Something tickled Famulus’ leg, and she gasped and snapped to her feet . In the water beside her was a long, shimmering tail like that of a man-sized fish. In fact, as the creature shimmied away through the water and breached not ten feet away from her, it revealed beautiful golden scales and the torso of a man. Famulus watched, entranced, as the creature swam near her again, pumping its powerful arms and tail.

The man-fish swam circles around her, not entirely unlike a man doing a side-stroke, but swimming faster than any pure human.

He popped out of the water beside her, almost as if he had feet too and were standing on the sand bar. He was darkly tanned, and his hair and beard were twisted into thick ropes the color of his scales.

“Where did you come from?” Famulus asked. “Do you belong to Ataro?”

“Everything belongs to Ataro,” he said. His eyes were solid black except for a golden ring where the iris should be, and he narrowed them as if the question didn’t make any sense.

“But I didn’t think Ataro kept any male servants.”

The man-fish shrugged. “Ataro created us, but we are not Ataro’s servants.”

“Are there more like you? More fish splices?”

“Shouldn’t a god know?” he asked.

“A god?” Famulus laughed. “I’m not a god.”

“Yes you are. You are like Ataro.”

“I’m not like Ataro,” Famulus said. “And Ataro isn’t a god.”

The man-fish dove into the water once more, and Famulus squirmed as he ran his hands up and down her legs under the surface.

“You don’t fool me,” the man-fish said when he resurfaced. “You have legs. You walk on the land. You are like Ataro.”

“More like him than you are, perhaps. But Ataro isn’t a god, and neither am I.”

“He calms the sea, or he makes it rage. He steps in the water to poison it when we do not please him. If he is not a god, then what is he?”

“I don’t know.”

“And if you are not a god, then what are you?”

Famulus was too taken aback to reply.

“Perhaps you are not like Ataro, perhaps you are a merciful god.” The man-fish grinned, revealing pointed teeth. “It is said Ataro would take mermaids to consort with. Perhaps this god would like a merman?”

Famulus gaped as she considered it. The man-fish was quite handsome, despite the strange eyes and the pointed teeth, but if he had anatomy with which to do the deed, she hadn’t seen it.

“You will have to catch me first,” he said, and arced into the water with a splash.

Famulus knew she couldn’t, and didn’t try.

“There used to be thousands of them,” Cybele said later, when Famulus asked her if there were any aquatic splices living on Molidae. “They would guard and clean the underwater purification systems. But they became more interested in their own business than Ataro’s, and Ataro had them all killed.”

 _Not all,_ Famulus didn’t say.

**

She met him at a banquet, a man with a chiseled, too pretty face who didn’t look a day over twenty, but had the slow, certain movements of an Entitled of great age. As she poured his glass, her eyes downcast, he looked full in her face, and smiled.

Normally, splice servants were ignored by all but their masters. It was rude to pay attention to them over an Entitled host, and Ataro was speaking. This man didn’t think Ataro would notice, or else just didn’t care.

Famulus felt herself flush, and nearly overfilled his glass.

When she wasn’t serving, she reclined on a bench on the perimeter of the room, part of the scenery. More than once over the course of the evening, she found the man’s eyes on her. After the meal was eaten and the guests began to mingle, he even went so far as to sit beside her on her perch.

Famulus jumped to stand and walk away, but the man followed her out into the foyer and into a courtyard. Her steps were hurried. His were calm and slow.

“What do you want?” she asked him when it was apparent that he wasn’t going to stop following her unless she ran.

“Only a word,” Titus said. “You were very pleasant to look at, and I wanted to find out if you were equally pleasant to talk to.”

Famulus had no experience speaking to Entitled who weren’t Ataro, and Ataro certainly didn’t speak to her like this. She had never been trained in how to respond to this insane breach of etiquette. It was like rifling through your host’s silverware.

“New to small talk? Let me guide you through it. This is where we introduce ourselves. My name is Titus Abrasax, and you are…?”

“Famulus,” she said, her eyes widening. Abrasax!

“Very good. Now, Famulus, tell me, what do you do here?”

Famulus gave him a withering look.

“Ah, of course, we’ll skip pleasantries. You fuck Ataro Demen. That is what you do here. As it happens, I would also like to fuck Ataro Demen, figuratively, and perhaps literally, and I thought you might help me.”

“He likes to be in control,” she said after a long pause.

“Does he? Or does he like to take control from you?”

“I… don’t know.”

“Does he give many orders, how specific are they?”

“Only a few, but they’re specific.”

“What does he do when you disobey? It doesn’t appear that you’ve been beaten often.”

“Humiliation, mostly.”

“And how do you feel about that?”

“Humiliated.”

“Why not angry?”

“What good would getting angry do me?”

“What good does humiliation do you? Famulus,” he said, taking a slow step toward her. “I knew when I looked at you that you don’t want to be here. You are _bored,_ Famulus, and this life, while lovely, is not enough for you.”

She thought, then, that he must truly have been paying attention. He must have seen her, really seen her, in a way no other had. She was so young, and Titus was so, so old.

“Does Ataro speak to you of his business?” he asked.

“Rarely. But I hear things. From him, from the other servants.”

“All the better, he won’t know you’re listening.”

Before she knew it, she was agreeing to spy for him.

They arranged a way for Famulus to send him information, and when Titus was able to negotiate a ridiculously cutthroat rate on water shipments to his refineries because he knew Ataro was desperate from the loss of several ships full of recycled water from Orus…. Well, no one was the wiser. Ataro and Titus even remained friends.

It didn’t occur to Famulus until much, much later that she never asked for anything in return.

**

“How much did you pay for me?” Famulus asked Titus.

“I would have traded a planet for you,” Titus said. “I would have signed over all my wealth including the clothes on my back to have you in my company.”

“But you didn’t.”

“No.”

“How much, My Lord Titus?”

“I traded six of my household servants for you. Ataro could have taken more, I gave him his pick.”

“Hmm,” Famulus said, not looking up from the sheave in her left and and the numbers she was tallying with her right.

“Why do you want to know?”

“Well, if those servitants were valued at the current average market price, I’ve made your investment back seven-hundred fold.”

**

Nearly a decade after Famulus met Titus, Ataro took a tour of Orus. It was something all Entitled were wont to do every now and then, so the media didn’t forget them. Scandals were free publicity, and no one created a scandal quite like Titus Abrasax, making him the ideal travel companion. Only a few dozen guards and servants from Ataro’s and Titus’ households accompanied them, and they painted the planet.

Titus had begun staking his claim on Famulus long ago when he first spoke to her in Ataro’s courtyard. It was on Orus that Famulus first staked a claim on Titus.

Though it seemed at first that Ataro was the one staking that claim. Ataro and Titus were fast friends and even faster lovers. Famulus hadn’t thought Ataro had any sexual interest in men at all, but that didn’t stop him from thrusting into Titus at every opportunity, usually while Famulus watched.

Titus, for his part, seemed to be making a show of it. He would moan and gasp while Ataro had his legs splayed. He would meet Famulus’ eyes across a room as he stroked himself.

Once, when Titus was half out of his mind on a mixture of wine and ambrosia, Ataro couldn’t help but notice that Titus was staring openly at Famulus while Ataro fucked him.

Ataro stopped mid pump, and so did Famulus’ heart.

But far from being angry, Ataro looked over his shoulder and laughed.

“Come, Famulus, I think he wants you,” he said in his deep, resonant voice.

Titus was too far gone to do much more than open his arms to her. Ataro wrapped himself in a robe and watched in satisfaction as Famulus mounted Titus and rode him in the way Ataro would never allow her to ride him.

**

“Did you know that you’ve become a bit of a fad?” Titus asked, raising one eyebrow.

“I don’t understand what you mean.”

“Caprintants,” he said, too casually. “Fauns, if you like. They’re all the rage. Amphora can’t turn them out fast enough.”

“I’m hardly the first Caprine splice.”

“No, but you’re the first to be so visible and with such….” he waved the hand with his glass in it at her. “Charms. You’re very striking there, at Ataro’s elbow. It’s an interesting artistic choice, no? Goats, not the least bit sexy, but you manage somehow.”

He sucked in a breath and leaned back to look at her intently.

 “I like to consider myself a patron of the arts, and you, my dear, are nothing if not a work of art. I wonder how I might convince Ataro to part with you.”

“I’m not for sale.”

“Good,” he said, one corner of his mouth quirking up. “I find I only enjoy buying things that aren’t for sale.”

With that, he drained his glass and strutted back to the banquet hall.

**

“Come, don’t be shy,” Titus said.

He had seen her nude innumerable times before, of course. Still, Famulus hesitated to let the cloth that wrapped her drop.

“Go ahead,” Titus whispered with uncharacteristic reverence, and gestured toward the little pool.

Famulus stepped in, hissing softly as the substance lapped around her ankles. It looked and felt so like water, but for the iridescent swirls that touched her skin as she lowered herself into the pool. She held her breath and submerged herself as energy perfectly matched to her genetic code surged through her.

“It feels good, doesn’t it?” Titus asked as she rose. His pupils were wide and he had the look of a starving man watching another feast.

“I can’t say how it feels,” Famulus said. She looked at her hands and arms. The skin was firmer, she supposed, but she felt no different.

“Ataro was cruel not to do this for you sooner,” Titus said, helping her to rewrap herself. “You were made to be admired.”

Ataro was typical not to do this for Famulus. Using Regenex on a splice was not unheard of, but it was rare. Buying a newer design of genomgineered human was simpler, and cheaper.

“This is yours,” Titus said. “Any time you wish it.”

Famulus fell into his arms, shivering and reeling at Titus’ lavish gift, the decades he had just added to her life, the centuries— _millennia—_ he had sworn to give her. But his other words carved themselves on her brain: _You were made to be admired._

_You were made to be admired._

You were made _only_ to be admired.

**

“How does it feel, for you, to be told that you are beautiful?” he asked, resting his chin on his hands and looking at her intently.

She laughed. “It feels nice, I suppose, why?”

“Well, if people tell me I am beautiful then that is a credit to my genetics, the long line of ancestry that has made me. If someone tells _you_ that you are beautiful, it is a credit to your splicer.”

“You have no more responsibility for how you were made than I have for how I was made.”

His full lips frowned at this. “No, I suppose not. It still feels nice, however.”

“If someone tells you that you are beautiful, My Lord Abrasax, it is likely flattery to get in your good graces.”

He pouted. “Surely not always, though?”

She considered him for a long moment before you she finally opened her mouth.

“You, My Lord Titus, are as beautiful  as you are vain.”

“Ah! Ah!” he said, clutching his chest in mock agony. “That is too much, Famulus, I cannot be that lovely! I would be positively incandescent.”

“Don’t let it go to your head.”

“I think it already has,” he said, staring at the ceiling in astonishment. “ _Wow._ ‘As beautiful as I am vain,’ I don’t believe I’ve _ever_ been paid such a compliment. But it’s not…” he began, flipping onto his stomach and becoming suddenly earnest. “It’s not entirely vanity, you know,” he said, gesturing vaguely at his face. “The reason I don’t ever let myself age. Neuroscience says that the brain doesn’t entirely mature until after the biological age of twenty-five, that your risk assessment and long-term planning are poor until then, and from the way Balem is always chiding me, perhaps that’s true. But also… the brain solidifies, crystallizes. It becomes more difficult to learn, to take in new experiences and, I think, to enjoy things. I don’t want to change. Not just my face, but who I _am._ ”

**

From the first day she entered Titus’ service, his other servants treated her coldly.

“They know you have my favor,” Titus said when she asked him about it, but Famulus suspected that wasn’t the whole truth.

Titus, while lavishly wealthy even by Entitled standards, was not nearly so wealthy as Ataro was. This surprised Famulus, given the Abrasax’ reputation, and she wondered if she had not made a terrible mistake in Ataro’s courtyard, all those years ago.

Titus didn’t have a true alcazar. The handful of planets he owned were too remote and uninteresting for his tastes, so he instead held court on the largest and most ornate of his ships.

Like on Molidae, Famulus had the status of a beloved pet, but unlike her time in Ataro’s service she had no friends and no vast collection of sheaves to entertain herself with. Titus doted on her, even _trusted_ her in a way that Ataro never had, but she still found herself confined to a smaller cage, entrapped by the very man who had promised to free her.

When Titus wasn’t fucking or being fucked by any of his dozens of splices, including Famulus herself, Famulus asked him questions. She asked about his business, about the Entitled, about his life before her, about how Regenex and harvests worked. While he was very willing to tell her, he often didn’t _know_ the answers to her more specific questions regarding his business.

So she went digging, and gradually found all the pieces of the puzzle that was Titus Abrasax. Titus had originally inherited fourteen planets and had been gradually selling them off ever since. With the proceeds he purchased exotic splices and funded lavish parties and collected rare objects of art.

She spent months steeling herself to bring it up to him. She thought of the merman who told her that she must be a god. She thought of Cybele telling her who was really in charge if a man’s cock was between your teeth.

Titus had promised Famulus an eternity, once, and she was going to take it from him.

“Are you aware that at your current rate of spending you are going to run out of money completely in eight centuries?” Famulus asked him.

“Oh? I thought I had at least a millennia,” Titus said flippantly.

Then it was as Famulus suspected. Titus wasn’t stupid. He _knew_ what he was doing. He just didn’t care enough to stop it. In fact, Titus’ strain of Regenex sold at a slightly higher price than Kalique and Balem’s, because there was less of it, because in his relative youth, Titus had dedicated himself to perfecting it.

“I thought that if I made the process as efficient as it could be…. Nevermind what I thought,” he said, and the light went out of his eyes for a moment, reminding Famulus for a moment of that night on Orus’ inner ring.

“If we harvest Califex a little early,” Famulus said. “It should be enough to keep us afloat, maybe even buy another mid-grade seed planet.”

“ _We?_ ” Titus said, raising an eyebrow. “ _Us?_ ”

The air went out of Famulus’ lungs. “I… I… meant…” she stammered. Famulus didn’t know what Titus did to punish his splices. She’d never seen it. Maybe because he never had to do it, because the threat of it was bad enough.

“I know what you meant,” Titus said, throwing himself into a chair and staring moodily into space.

Titus’ face contorted. He looked, for a moment, like he might actually be Balem’s brother, and then he wilted, looking his physical age for once. Little more than a boy.

“Do what you like,” he said. “Let me know if you need my signet.” He strode into his quarters, locking the door behind him.

**

Ataro had treated Famulus with little more than indifference for years. She had gone from beloved pet to disused toy gathering dust in the attic. So when the earring Ataro she had received on her first day in Ataro’s service buzzed, Famulus was shocked, unsure whether she should be delighted or fearful.

“Titus Abrasax has offered generous terms for your sale,” Ataro said, barely glancing at her over the sheaves he was studying. “I’ve taken them.”

Famulus stared. She didn’t know what to say, so she said nothing.

“He is coming to fetch you within the hour. Make yourself ready.”

“Yes, My Lord,” she said, and saw herself out. It was the last time she ever saw him.

Soon she was rising in a sparkling blue column of light, looking over the island that had been her home for most of the past two decades.

Titus took her hand as she came aboard. “I want you to understand, Famulus, that I am taking you into my service, not as a pleasure slave, but as an advisor and confidante, and…. If you are willing to consider me as such…. a friend.”

Famulus knew Titus well enough by now to know that his hesitance was feigned, but even the staged vulnerability gave her an opening.

“I hope my experience as a pleasure slave won’t be entirely wasted, however?” she said, brushing his neck and his chin with two fingers. “My Lord Titus?”

“I think we’ll both find a way to put it to good use,” Titus said with a smile.

**

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you, Jupiter Ascending fandom for reading my nutty, slutty ramblings.
> 
> Obviously, these scenes are in Quentin Tarantino order rather than chronological order, so I hope you were able to make sense of them. Jupiter Ascending is out on BluRay today! Whoop!


End file.
